This idea has been floating around in my mind for a while. Since I'm terrible at making lures, here it is for someone to tinker with.

Step 1: Take a flat, thin, clear piece of plastic or similar material and print a trout tail on it. You could go photo finish here, like a photo of a real trout tail.

Step 2: Put this printed piece in the tail section of a lure mold like say an 8" Hudd.

Step 3: Pour the lure with clear plastic. Not smoke color, but crystal clear.

Step 4: Paint the whole bait except for the tail.

Now you have a very realistic tail that appears flat to the fish, but that generates action. As great as these wedge tail baits are, the biggest drawback in my mind has always been the lack of realism in the tail area.

Most tails are painted black and it looks ok, but it looks nothing like how a real trout tail looks from behind or underneath where the bass is looking. Foods for thought :)

Rob, Great minds think alike!
I thought of this about 3 years ago. I was all excited about untill I actualy did it. I was even thinking about looking into a patent. Ok here is the reality. It looks like crap in real life. Clear plastic is not that clear and in the water plastisol absorbs water and becomes clouded. Soo what you get is a tail that starts out looking a little clouded in the water and looks worse as you fish it. Untill you actualy see it in the water, you invision this bait that aprears to have a flat tail but swims as if it has a wedge tail. In theory it sounds awsome. It just doesnt look good. Even before it clouds up it looks bad in the water. I was quite disaponted when I did it. It looked more unnatural then the fat knobby painted wedgetail. If you can have your buddies pour you a clear hammer swimbait you will see what I am talking about once you swim the bait. Plus a wedge tail is probaly ywice as thick as a 5in Hammer so its even more visable. There are other posabilities that I have on the back burner that I may someday revisit.

Hm, glad to hear you at least tried it. Sorry to hear it didn't work out that well. Big Hammer actually has a crystal clear color called Everclear

http://www.swimbait.com/bighammer/images/hps40105.jpg

The photo above makes it look gray on the back but the lure really is clear and as far as I've seen it stays clear after use. It does pick up dust/dirt on it so a used one looks a bit dingy, but if you put a new one in the water it's like clear clear.

Granted the plastic in a Big Hammer is not the same as an injected lure. I don't know a ton about plastics but I gather that people use many variations. Maybe there's one out there somewhere that would work :)